UPDATE: Venom Contest (Done and Submitted)

Venom has always been one of my favorite characters and with the movie coming out, they are running a contest. Submit your Venom art and they will pick 15 winners. Of course if you are picked they get to use your art for promotions and what not. But if you don't win, you get to keep the rights to it. Anyway, since I never win any contests, I figure why not try another. LOL

Here is where you all come into play, please help me pick which sketch I should go with.

A. The symbiote is half on his face, so you can see some human flesh.
B. Full on Venom
C. Full body Venom with parts of human flesh and the symbiote flying around him.

At fist I was liking A, but the more I look at it I like C. What are your votes?

@Chip-Valecek C has a lot more drama and struggle with transformation and pose so I am liking that one for that reason. I don't know much about Venom as a character past what I have seen in maybe one movie, but I think he is really cool. I definitely like internal turmoil in characters that manifests on the exterior. No one by God really knows our inner struggle so I think that's a real powerful subject to tackle. Whether you win or not, good for you for challenging yourself! Have you an idea for your background?

@heather-boyd I think i will leave the background somewhat plain to give the focus on the character itself. They said you can use the logo from the movie in the piece, so I plan to add that above him and was thinking of adding some text below it. Almost like a movie poster.

I see a lot of votes for C but I'm pushing B. C has issues with focal point leading you out of the design. I'm also suggesting you don't "paint" it but rather go pen tool and graphic shapes, I know this isn't how you normally work but this type of thing needs to work at the size of a playing card and a huge poster

@rcartwright I see what you mean with the focal point, I was thinking of turning his head in and using his tongue to lead you around the image since it will mostly be black/blue and the tongue will be red. That would be the focal point.

I agree with the ink/shapes but I am not good enough with that style. I might try doing both and seeing which works. When I do paint i do it at like 20 inches at the longest side which would be able to scale up and down.

So I'm not going to be much help here I'm afraid, but I'll chime in anyway, lol. I know jack squat about venom, but after looking at the trailer, I like either A or C. My first impression was C, because yes it looks more dynamic. But I'm also drawn to A because venom has such a gnarly head design that a portrait could really show it off.

And I don't know how quite to articulate this, but in my opinion, portraits tend to feel more personal. It's like the equivalent of interacting with someone at a close distance. It puts you face to face with them and a sort of relationship it formed and you wonder more about their motivations as a character. Zoomed out views puts more distance between you and the character and you start wondering about them in the context of a larger scene. You're relationship to them is more passive, but it creates more action and you wonder what they'll do. Even with an intense character like venom, I think this concept still applies. I'm not saying one is better than the other, but it can inform the way you want to have your viewer interact with the character.

@Eric-Castleman the only reason I didn't do a side view is because so many fan art pieces are done that way and I wanted to stand out a little.

@TessaW I totally understand where you are coming from on that. That is why I was drawn to A as well at first. But with so many going with C maybe I will try to do both. I think you get to submit up to 10 per artist. Who has time for 10 LOL

@chip-valecek SO stoked for this movie! If you could somehow combine A and C, (piece of cake, right?! Haha!) Use the dynamic element of the pose of C but incorporate elements of his human face like you did in A?

@eli I think you may be onto something here, so I combined them. With A being a faded out in the background.

But now I read over the details of the contest and they state "Artists, designers and illustrators from around the world are invited to create one-of-a-kind static artwork for Venom inspired by the latest trailer. Venom faces off against Riot and we’d like you to summon your inner anti-hero and unleash your imagination to show us the best battle scene you can capture."

Do you think I need to rethink this and do a fight scene? Most of the entries people posted in the comments are not fight scene with Riot...

Anyways "symbiotic" came up as well. Maybe develop in your work how Riot came into being along with battling. An extension from human/Spider man to Venom and from Venom the "child" Riot. As I said I don't know the stroy very well, but even if others are not doing it, but it has been asked to include it, do take their suggestion to heart if you feel you are capable of pulling it off!

@heather-boyd the symbiote is basically an alien that attaches itself to a host to survive. For the sake of the movie the symbiote Venom has Eddie Brock (spiderman was originally the first to have it) and Riot has the head of the Life Foundation. There are other symbiotes like Carnage being my favorite, and I have a feeling he might be a hidden character in the movie. But now my nerd is showing and getting off topic LOL.

I will sketch out a new idea and post it tonight. If I have time I might as well finish the one I started above and submit both.

@chip-valecek You can't go wrong with a fight scene. More characters equals a more dynamic illustration which equals a higher level of difficulty. That will help you help you stand out especially if others are not doing it.